The Age of Hope (8 page)

“Come on, Hope. For goodness’ sake. Betty Friedan. She’s from New York. She says that women need to be emancipated. It’s brilliant.”

Though Hope didn’t believe herself trapped in any way, she resented the implication. So what if she hadn’t heard of Betty Friedan? Emily was still talking about her course and about the professor, a youngish man who wore a beret to class and who was American and lived with an American woman who was also a professor of psychology. “They aren’t married,” Emily said. “Just lovers.”

Hope wondered what “just lovers” meant, but she didn’t ask. She felt suddenly old and stupid. She didn’t
know
anything, and this was a depressing thought. On the other hand, she wondered if there wasn’t entirely too much thinking going on and not enough work. Work was good for the soul. Thinking sometimes just confused the heart. Leisure, as Roy said, was a luxury that shouldn’t be overindulged, and for once Hope agreed.

One day there was a knock at the door and when Hope opened it she discovered Harlin, the hitchhiker, standing there, and beside him a young woman.

Hope tilted her head, unsure why Harlin was visiting, and then she laughed and said, “Do you need a ride somewhere?”

“Just got one,” Harlin said. Then he said, “Joking,” and he pointed at a Studebaker sitting in the driveway. “Got my own ride now.” He waited.

“Well,” Hope said, “do you want to come in?” She was showing already and she saw the young woman studying her stomach, and in order to make everyone comfortable, she said, “I’m pregnant,” and she made a little curtsy right there on the green linoleum.

Conner walked in holding a toy gun and he pointed it at Harlin and shot him.

“Got me,” Harlin cried and he stumbled across the kitchen holding his chest. Conner thought this hilarious. So he shot him again and again, and with each bullet Harlin writhed and groaned.

Hope pulled Conner’s arm and said, “That’s enough, Conner. He’s dead.” She told him that these were friends from long ago.

“Eight years. Maybe more. This is Ella, my fiancée.”

Hope shook Ella’s hand. Ella nodded but didn’t say anything. Conner pulled his mother down to whisper in her ear.

“They’re dark.”

“Yes, they are,” she said.

“Why?”

“Off you go.” She pushed him towards the back door.

“See ya, buddy,” Harlin called out.

Hope didn’t recall him being so talkative and she said so. “Last time I saw you you said maybe three words. I did all the talking.”

“And your husband.”

“What do you mean?”

“He drove me all the way back to Kenora and he talked and talked. He talked about work and honesty, and he talked about everybody getting a kick at the can. And he offered me a job at his garage. I told him that I couldn’t live in a town that was all white.” He looked at Ella and then Hope and he grinned. “Still is white. I told Ella that there wasn’t a single Indian in this place. Or Chinese, or black man.”

She wasn’t sure what Harlin wanted. She didn’t like his take on the town, though he was absolutely right. She said, “So you want a job now? After all these years?”

“Hell, no. I’m a roofer in Kenora. No, me and Ella were passing by and I said you want to see a town in a time warp and she said yeah and so we took a detour. We went shopping, by the way, at your second-hand place. Lady there told us where your new house was. Ella’s looking for a wedding dress.”

Harlin stopped talking and pulled out a pack of cigarettes and lit one and exhaled. Hope fetched a saucer and laid it before him. He waved the smoke away and said, “You’re looking good, Hope. I was nineteen back then, and I told Ella that you were quite a looker. It was very different, you inviting me in like that. I thought that you were either nuts, crazy, or didn’t care.”

“Oh, I care. Thank you very much. I trusted you.”

“That’s what I said to Ella.” He grinned.

Hope turned to Ella and said, “I’ve got a wedding dress. And we ‘re almost the same size, don’t you think? Except I’m bigger at the moment.” She stood and indicated that Ella should stand as well. She stepped towards Ella and faced her. They were eye to eye. “Pretty close, don’t you think?” She looked at Harlin.

He put out his cigarette and nodded. “Whaddid I tell ya, El? Isn’t she a wonder?”

“I’ll go upstairs and look. It’s in the cedar closet.”

She climbed to the second floor and passed by Penny, who was sitting on the stairs with her notebook and pen. “Are you eavesdropping again?” Hope said good-naturedly. Penny’s habit over the past year, since she had learned to read and write, was to listen in on adult conversations and take notes. Penny shrugged and closed her notebook. Hope found the dress in the back of the closet, covered in plastic, and she carried it back downstairs. On the stairs, Penny said, “You’re going to give it to them for free?”

“To borrow. That’s all. Don’t worry. Are you worried?”

Penny had a long face and a mouth like Roy’s, and whenever she was uncertain, her mouth went downwards in an unhappy way, like Roy’s, and it was doing that now.

“They’ll bring it back, sweetie,” Hope said. “What am I to do with it? It’s just sitting there, in a bag.”

She continued to the kitchen. She removed the plastic and held up the dress and said, “So?”

“It’s a beauty,” Harlin said.

“You could try it on,” she said, and she took Ella back up the stairs, past Penny, and closed her in the master bedroom. Ella came back downstairs wearing the dress, no shoes, and for a moment, when Hope saw the manner in which Ella’s long dark hair fell over the bone-coloured buttons at the back of the dress, she suffered a pang of regret. She said, “It fits you. Very nice.”

“Better than nice. Sexy,” Harlin said and he pulled Ella onto his lap.

Hope had the strange sense that Harlin had just pulled
her
onto his lap, this being her kitchen and that being her wedding dress. Even Ella seemed uncomfortable. She stood and brushed lightly at the front of the dress and asked Hope if she was sure.

“I’m sure,” she said, though she wasn’t sure at all. “Don’t bother cleaning it. I’ll get it dry-cleaned.”

Later, after Harlin and Ella were gone, Penny appeared and poured herself a glass of milk and then sat at the table and watched her mother prepare supper. Penny didn’t speak—she just watched. She was empty-handed, her notebook was upstairs. Sometimes, Penny made Hope nervous with her silences and long gazes and this was one of those times. She looked at her daughter and then went back to her work and finally Penny spoke.

She said, “What will Daddy say?”

“About what?”

“The wedding dress. That you gave it away?”

“I didn’t give it away. I loaned it to them. They were in need. Daddy will understand.”

Penny got up and wandered into the living room. Then the side door opened and closed and from the kitchen window Hope saw Penny in the backyard, on the swing, and Conner was aiming his pistol at her and shooting her. Penny kept swinging and Conner kept shooting.

At supper, which was roast chicken and mashed potatoes and gravy and corn from a can, she came right out and said that Harlin and his fiancée had visited and she’d given them her wedding dress. “You remember Harlin, don’t you?” she asked Roy.

He looked at her and said that he did. “I thought you were saving the dress for the girls. For Judith.”

“For me?” Judith asked. “I’m never getting married.”

Hope wondered where such disdain for marriage came from. What did she see in her parents’ world that made her talk this way? Perhaps she had been unduly influenced by Angela and Emily.

“Never say never,” Hope said.

“You just did,” Penny said.

“Did what?”

“Said ‘never.’
Never say never.
You said it.”

“It’s a saying. It’s meant to be ironic.”

“What if they don’t bring the dress back?” This was Conner. He was studying the piece of chicken on his plate, picking at it, moving it from side to side.

“Well, then, that means they needed it more than I did.” She looked at her eldest daughter. “And Judith, should she get married someday, will have to get herself a new dress.” She smiled, as if in cahoots with Judith, but Judith didn’t smile back.

“What’s ‘ironic’?” Penny asked.

“Daddy will tell you,” Hope said. “I’m tired.” She got up and walked up the stairs and removed her clothes and climbed under the covers. She lay there with her eyes open, listening to the movements and mumblings of the family downstairs. It wasn’t fair just to throw everything onto Roy’s lap—he was tired too—but she wasn’t able to keep her shoulders square anymore. She slept, and when she woke Roy was snoring beside her. She got up and walked to her children’s rooms and found them all safe in bed and sleeping. Conner had thrown off his covers, and his left foot had tumbled off the bed and was dragging on the floor. She tucked him back in and kissed his damp forehead. He smelled of soap and talcum powder, and she realized that Roy had bathed him, or Conner had bathed himself, before bedtime. She imagined that if she should die, the children would be fine. They would eat and dress themselves and go to school and fight and come home and shampoo their hair and Roy would perhaps hire a woman to come in and wash the clothes and the floors and make meals and the woman would be young and pretty and efficient, with a flat stomach and a perfect body, and Roy, gullible and flirtatious, would fall in love with the woman and marry her and the kids would adore the new wife. Everyone might be happier if Hope weren’t around. But then who would understand Conner’s obstreperousness, or Judith’s eccentricities, such as her desire never to marry, or Penny’s dark and brooding silences, her piercing and all-knowing eye. Some strange new wife could never guess at these oddities. No, Hope would have to raise the children.

In the morning, a bright blue sky welcomed her. Roy had left for work and Judith was already at school, and when she came down to the kitchen, she saw Conner and Penny at the table eating oatmeal. There was a strange woman at the stove. Well, not so strange. It was Heidi Goosen, Roy’s cousin’s child, a buxom girl of twenty-two whom the children already knew from family gatherings, and whom they adored.

“Why are you here?” Hope asked.

“Oh, Auntie Hope, good morning. Roy called me early this morning and said that you weren’t feeling well and could I come over and watch the children.”

“I’m fine. I’m well.”

“Okay.” This girl with the large bosom was not to be deterred. “I’m glad to hear that. I packed Judith a lunch. She’s going to Angela’s house after school. Later, I’m taking Conner and Penny to the library and then out for grilled cheese sandwiches and fries.”

“Really.”

“Don’t worry. Uncle Roy gave me money for lunch.”

Conner was chanting, “Grilled cheese and fries,” and spinning his spoon in his porridge.

“All right then,” Hope said and she turned and walked back up the stairs and lay down. She had nothing against Heidi Goosen: she was lovely, and she was family. She wasn’t the girl of Roy’s dreams, that was certain. And Roy was simply trying to give Hope a break, she could see that. She heard the children leave with Heidi. She rose and went to the bathroom and ran a bath. She lay for a long time in the water, refilling it, heating it up. She shaved her legs and under her arms. She lay back and studied her belly, which from this perspective appeared not at all large. She placed her hands on her stomach and waited to see if the baby would move. There had been a few bumps over the last while. Nothing at the moment. She got out of the tub and dried herself and then walked about the house in her housecoat. In the kitchen she removed the calendar from the fridge. Put it in the garbage. She took the calendar in the dining room, the one with the photographs of Paris, and she threw that out as well. She took the clock hanging above the piano and carried it to the garage and laid it down on Roy’s worktable. The grandfather’s clock in the living room was too large to move, so she found a sheet and hung it over the clock face. The clock on the stove was permanent—nothing to be done with that. She taped a piece of blank paper over it. The bedroom clock and the upstairs hall clock were portable and she moved those into her shoe closet, tucked away in a box with a lid. Then she found a suitcase and packed a few things—an extra skirt and blouse, some underwear, a second bra, pantyhose, a second pair of shoes, her makeup, her hairbrush, her Bible, a few books—and she carried the suitcase down to her car. She went back inside and wrote a note to Roy. She said, “I’m going away for a little while. Maybe two days. Thank you for asking Heidi to help out. She’s a godsend. My head is above water. Love, Hope.”

She drove to Winnipeg and took a room at a hotel close to the train station. It was spring, the trees were greening, the earth smelled new, and the streets were busy with couples strolling arm in arm. She decided to take a walk herself and made her way down towards the river, where she watched the ducks and the geese. She decided that she would smoke, so she went into a little store and asked for cigarettes. The man behind the counter asked what kind of cigarettes did she want and she said calmly, “Just give me the most popular.” The man raised an eyebrow and handed her a package of du Maurier and she paid and walked out. She sat in the bar of the hotel and ordered a glass of wine and she smoked, though she didn’t inhale because it made her dizzy. A man in a grey suit and a grey hat tried to talk to her. He leaned towards her and asked if she was alone and she looked at him and said that she was waiting for her husband. He said sorry and left.

That night she wanted to call home, but she didn’t. She thought Roy needed to be punished in some way, and if this was it, then so be it. He had all the pleasures, all the freedom, and now, for two days, she was going to be the one to demand certain pleasures and freedoms. She hoped the children would remember to brush their teeth before bedtime. Conner liked a warm glass of milk, and Penny liked to read till nine. This was allowed, but Roy wouldn’t be aware. But the kids would make him aware, certainly. She had raised them to be clear and headstrong and forthright. Poor Judith, probably believing that her mother was gone for good—because it would be Judith who would suffer doubts and fears. She needed her mother the most, and thinking of this now, Hope felt an overwhelming love for her oldest child.